Rice Diet Founder Dr. Walter Kempner

In 1934 as a doctor at Duke Hospital, Dr. Walter Kempner starting treating patients with malignant hypertension (very high blood pressure) and kidney disease with what he called “The Rice Diet” when there was no other treatment available anywhere. He gave it the name as patients usually ate a bowl of white rice at every meal. It became obvious to Dr. Kempner that the prevention and treatment of these diseases would be best treated with a no salt added diet. Dr. Kempner found out very early that the low fat content of the diet also enhanced weight loss. When Dr. Kempner tried to have patients maintain their weight by increasing portion size and adding sugars to foods, patients still lost weight. They just couldn’t eat enough calories with so little fat in the diet. The program has continued over the years with the same philosophy of a low-sodium, low-fat diet.

In the 1930’s and 40’s, people that were diagnosed with illnesses such as high blood pressure and kidney disease were offered no hope for long-term survival. These diseases were considered lethal. Dr. Kempner experimented with animal tissue for many years and began to treat human patients in 1939. He began to see unprecedented results starting with a woman who reversed her kidney disease in a few months time and another who was comatose with malignant hypertension who regained alertness. There were no other drugs or treatments available other than this diet.

Dr. Kempner went on to research and publish revolutionary results on the Rice Diet’s dramatic beneficial effect not only on kidney disease and hypertension, but on cholesterol, cardiovascular disease, congestive heart failure and diabetes. He retired in 1992 in his 90th year (as Dr. Kempner would say) and he passed away in 1997. The Rice Diet has continued to produce these significant improvements and outstanding medical results for these diseases along with other disorders of lifestyle origin such as sleep apnea, psoriasis, pulmonary hypertension, edema and joint stiffness associated with arthritis.

Here are some of Dr. Kempner’s articles from his bulletins and other journals:

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11 thoughts on “Rice Diet Founder Dr. Walter Kempner”

The requirement for a gestational diabetes plan is
important because an uncontrolled blood sugar levels level can lead to the incidence
of birth defect or miscarriage. Some might require insulin injection but you are
never prescribed with oral medication to preclude any unknown negative effects.

These two links — to pdf files on thewaytoeat.ca — are not working.
Would you please correct them? Thank you!
Metabolic Diseases: Research, Diagnosis, Treatment (June 1972)
The Deadly Role of Salt in Kidney Disease (June 1972)

Hello Krista
I have checked the links and the ones checked seemed to be linked correctly. Could you provide the page URL where the links are not working. We will link them right away. Thanks for your feedback.
Ian